Education in the media, as seen in Kappan 

Interest in media narratives about schools goes back a long way, and so has the education community’s interest in shaping those narratives. In April 1941, E.L. Callahan wrote in Kappan (“Publicizing the school”) about his survey of Texas high schools that sought to determine  how they were using local media to bring publicity to themselves. The answer? They weren’t doing enough. Only a third had any sort of publicity staff and few were making use of the journalism programs within their schools to draw media attention. 

Callahan’s findings raised the question of why schools should even care to attract media attention. As Paul Jones and Clyde Parker explained in March 1947 (“Publicity builds public relations”), schools have a responsibility to the public, and publicity programs enable them to show the public how well they’re meeting their responsibilities: 

A good publicity program can also provide an essential counter-narrative in a climate where misconceptions and false narratives about schools abound, as Ted Gordon explained in May 1949 (“Pressure, publicity, or public relations?”):